Notes on the data: Aboriginal premature mortality by sex

Deaths of Aboriginal males aged 0 to 64 years, 2009 to 2013

Policy context: Around 3,000 Indigenous Australians die each year, resulting in almost 100,000 years of life lost due to premature death [1]. Chronic disease is responsible for a major part of the life expectancy gap; and accounts for some two thirds of the premature deaths among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians [2].

The median age at death in 2013 for Indigenous males ranged from 48.8 years for those living in South Australia to 58.5 years for those living in New South Wales [3]. These levels were around 20 years less than those for non-Indigenous males, which ranged from 69.9 years (Northern Territory) to 80.0 years (South Australia).

For deaths data released since 2007, the ABS has applied a staged approach to the coding of cause of death which affects the number of records available for release at any date. In each release, the latest year’s data is preliminary, the second latest is revised and the data for the remaining years is final. For further information about the ABS revisions process see the following and related sites: http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/3303.0Explanatory+Notes12012.

Data quality

Almost all deaths in Australia are registered. However, Indigenous status is not always recorded, or recorded correctly. The incompleteness of Indigenous identification (referred to as completeness of coverage) means that the number of deaths registered as Indigenous is an underestimate of the actual number of deaths which occur in the Indigenous population. It should also be noted that completeness of coverage is likely to vary between geographical areas.

While there is incomplete coverage of Indigenous deaths in all state and territory registration systems, some jurisdictions have been assessed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) as having a sufficient level of coverage to enable statistics on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mortality to be produced. Those jurisdictions are New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory.

Numerator: Deaths of Aboriginal males aged 0 to 64 years

Denominator: Male Aboriginal population aged 0 to 64 years

Detail of analysis: Average annual indirectly age-standardised rate per 100,000 Aboriginal males (aged 0 to 64 years); and/or indirectly age-standardised ratio, based on the Australian standard

Source: Data compiled by PHIDU from deaths data based on the 2009 to 2013 Cause of Death Unit Record Files supplied by the Australian Coordinating Registry and the Victorian Department of Justice, on behalf of the Registries of Births, Deaths and Marriages and the National Coronial Information System. The population is the estimated resident population (ERP) (non-ABS) at 30 June 2011, compiled by PHIDU based on data developed by Prometheus Information Pty Ltd, under a contract with the Australian Government Department of Health.